


Bubbles in a Champagne Glass

by SachiNau



Category: Chernobyl (TV 2019)
Genre: Banter, Chernobyl New Year Challenge 2021, Drinking, Gen, M/M, Mystery Liqueur, New Year's Party, Open Relationships, Pining, Polyamory, all the forgotten wives, competetive dad-off, my first happy fanfic, sue me, yes I am going to hell for it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-17
Updated: 2021-02-17
Packaged: 2021-03-11 23:35:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,690
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29500737
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SachiNau/pseuds/SachiNau
Summary: The Chernobyl NPP is hosting a New Year's Party, and boy it is a memorable one.
Relationships: Aleksandr Akimov/Leonid Toptunov, Aleksandr Akimov/Lyubov Akimova
Comments: 8
Kudos: 6





	Bubbles in a Champagne Glass

**Author's Note:**

> Lyrics: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_4KBfWjbpA

_When I lay my head_

_I find I can't unwind_

_I come alive_

_All these things are overdue_

_But there's nothing I'd rather do_

_Swinging between hell and you_

_Trying not to confuse the two_

_It's life in a bubble I blew_

It was a beautiful, crisply cold night on New Years Eve, and fifty-five year old Anatoly Stepanovich Dyatlov was beginning to seriously question the life decisions that lead him to this moment.

The Palace of Culture was full of noise and people, both familiar and unfamiliar. The Chernobyl NPP New Year’s Party was in full swing; engineers and operators crowded around tables filled with food and alcohol, their families chatted to builders and firemen, electricians and welders were dancing silly little jigs with laughing kids. 

Dyatlov had his wife and son around, all his friends were somewhere in the crowd drinking and talking. Yet he somehow ended up sipping on a glass of vodka, listening intently to an overgrown, enthusiastic puppy in a fireman's dress uniform making valid points in their ongoing debate about certain themes in Pushkin’s writing. He knew Volodymyr Pravik only superficially before, and he wasn’t sure how he ended up in the company of a fireman half his age instead of literally anybody else’s. But _damn it!_ He was enjoying the conversation. It was _refreshing_. 

His face must not have shown how engaged he was with the young man and his intelligent arguments, given in that soft Ukranian accent of his. At least Sitnikov did not think so: he careened into him from the left, barging into his shoulder, sloshing some more vodka into his glass. He politely and discreetly told him to “not butcher the kid’s self-esteem for fucks sake Tolya _please_ , just have a reasonable adult conversation, don’t glare at the boy like that!” and apologized to Pravik profusely about having to talk to ‘cranky mean old men’. Dyatlov gave him a _‘stop talking’_ glare strong enough to strip paint from walls, and gestured at Pravik to go on. At this point, any further argument on his part would have been fruitless, as the lad quite efficiently dismissed more than half of his talking points as fallacies and turned the rest on their head, checked for leaks and found plenty.

Dyatlov was soundly beaten in an intellectual fight by a puppy.

“How old are you, again?”

Pravik beamed.

“Twenty-four, sir!”

_Less_ than half his age then. Questionable decisions indeed. Dyatlov sighed, and took a swig of his vodka. Sitnikov burst out laughing.

“Do you need to go sulk a little?” he asked cheerfully, bumping his shoulder with Dyatlov’s, and spilling some of the unidentifiable, dark booze in his own glass. Whatever he had in there smelled strong enough that Dyatlov was surprised the floor didn’t start sizzling on contact with it. “Or will you bully some of your employees to let off steam?”

“I don’t _bully_ my employees, Tolya, I _instruct_ them,” Dyatlov grumbled.

“Sure you do,” Sitnikov smiled genially. “How many of them have you made cry in the last month?”

“None!”

“Not even Toptunov?? That’s an achievement. I am impressed. I’ll tell Bryukhanov to give you a medal for ‘Most Tolerable Boss’, you can pin it on your forehead, it’ll look great!”

Dyatlov gave him a magnificent, much practiced stink-eye, and decided to light up a cigarette before deigning that stupidity with an answer.

“They’ve been doing a good job, no need to ‘bully’ them as you put it,” he declared with a flourish of smoke. “Toptunov especially. That April scare did him good. Say, Comrade Pravik, don’t you want to become a nuclear engineer? If we had ten more smart lads like you, we could run this plant like clockwork.”

“I’m not much for mathematics, Sir, but thank you for the compliment.”

Sitnikov promptly ignored the gently bemused Pravik to instead squint suspiciously at his old coworker.

“Did you just praise Toptunov?” he asked, disbelieving. 

Dyatlov gave an expansive shrug.

“Kid learns fast. Always a good quality to have.”

“Just a few months ago you were like ‘if Yura wasn’t there, those incompetent morons would have blown a fuel channel!’” Sitnikov’s reenactment, complete with grand, angry gesturing that resulted in more of the industrial paint thinner in his glass spilling to the floor, was so dramatic that several people in the vicinity burst out in giggles. “You cursed him so much I thought the poor guy would die of hiccups.”

Dyatlov rolled his eyes.

“I wasn’t sleeping much back then, I might have been a tad bit snappy. Anyway, the boy is barely old enough to drink. It’ll be a while until reactor operation becomes routine for him, like it is for Yura. But he has potential.” He waved, not so subtly putting his cigarette out in his friend’s glass of mystery liquor, which he didn’t notice. Pravik did though, and promptly choked on his drink. Dyatlov fished the pack out of his suit pocket to light another one. 

Sitnikov stared at him in disbelief.

“Are you the real Anatoly Dyatlov, or are you some kind of western spy?”

Dyatlov gave him a withering glare above his lighter.

And then he yelped, when Sitnikov, clumsily trying to check his identity, poked his cheek, then yanked on his mustache, ripping out a few silvery hairs.

“ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR MIND?” he roared, batting his hands away.

Sitnikov just laughed.

***

Even without hearing the surreal moment of his boss praising him, Leonid Toptunov was having a very strange evening.

He didn’t particularly want to come to this grand power plant-organized New Year's celebration in the first place, but his coworkers managed to successfully cajole, gently bully and persistently persuade him to attend anyway. They didn’t know why he was in such a slump, and thankfully did not pry either. They did, however, insist that attending would be good for him. So Leonid ended up at the party, in his most comfortable suit, sipping on a glass of champagne, and drifting on the edges of various conversations.

That is, until he got quite literally captured by none other than Lyubov Akimova, Sasha Akimov’s stern-looking wife.

Lyubov was the kind of straight-backed, somewhat imposing beauty that only comes from a military breeding. She was also tall enough to comfortably throw an arm around Leonid’s bony shoulders, and keep it there all evening but for a few trips to acquire more champagne.

They knew each other briefly, from previous company parties and the peripheries of various shift fishing trips and countryside jaunts; they were on good terms, but not this good. Still, Lyuba, as she insisted he call her, must have seen something in his eyes that evening that made her latch onto him, and gently steer him towards ‘good company’.

The ‘good company’ in this case was a trio of couples: a fact that made Leonid intensely uncomfortable at first. There were: the Stolyarchuks, Boris, cheerful as usual, and his oft-praised fianceé Nina; the Kirschenbaums, the ever-inscrutable Igor, and his wife Alla, a woman his coworkers only learned about after two years of knowing him; and the Davletbayevs, Razim, looking just a touch less harried and resigned with the telephone in his hand replaced by a champagne glass, and Inze, who didn’t even blink when Lyuba dragged some awkward boy into their circle instead of his husband. She just smiled warmly at Leonid, and proceeded to act like it was perfectly natural that he was there.

It was the combined effort of Lyuba and Inze’s nonchalance that finally let Lenya be comfortable, although the champagne definitely helped too. He kept quietly drinking and listening to the ongoing conversation that ricochéd between movies, gossip, radio shows, work, music and upcoming vacations. He occasionally contributed here and there, but was mostly content with sipping from his glass and observing the rare sight of his coworkers outside their usual environment. 

The champagne, and Lyuba’s measured breathing at his side, made him feel warm and strangely floaty: a bit detached, but not in a particularly bad way. He looked at his company the same way he imagined Yuri Gagarin might have looked at Earth: flying high above the surface, with his tiny pod his only tether to humanity. He noticed, fascinated, that he never heard Igor laugh as much as he did when listening to Boris’ fantastical tale involving frogs, vodka, rubber boots and moonlight. His eyes often got caught in Razim’s dark curls, only to be freed when Inze ran a tender hand through his hair. A longing bloomed in his chest for that familiar, casual intimacy he now lost. Lyuba remained his tether, an anchor to keep him from drifting too far into melancholy or isolation. The weight of her arm around his shoulder, the warm tickle of her breath as she whispered snarky little comments into his ear, her faint smell of roses, and their breathing synching up slowly but inexorably, kept him firmly in the here and now. 

Well, at least in the now. His gaze often wandered to his newfound anchor’s husband. Sasha, standing in a group of assorted coworkers nearby, was quite dashing in his beige suit. He was also quite drunk and quite loud.

“AS IF I’m letting my boys marry into your family!” he grinned as gestured at Khodemchuk, who laughed uproariously at this. “If you were some nobleman at least, that would be acceptable, but I’m not letting them marry a daughter of some glorified _plumber_!”

“The glorified _babysitter_ can shut it,” Khodemchuk fired back. “My girl will be the boss of your brats someday, I just know it! She’s got a good head.”

“Crazy how the kids can be so smart, right?” Yuvchenko jumped in, absolutely beaming. “My Kirill is only three, but he says he’s going to be a doctor someday! I swear he’s got more brains than I do sometimes.”

“Well lad… That’s not exactly a hard feat, having more brains than you do,” commented Perevozchenko. His sardonic comment caused Khodemchuk to snort loudly, Sasha to nearly fall over with laughter and Yuvchenko to splutter indignantly. Leonid almost burst out laughing too, before he remembered he was probably not supposed to be eavesdropping on other people’s conversations. “Anyhow, if you kids have spawns as ugly as you are, then it’s all moot anyway.”

“Have you looked in the mirror lately, Valera?” inquired Yuvchenko with mock gentleness. “Or did it crack when you did?”

“Oh get fucked…!”

_“Gentlemen_.”

The entire band of bragging fathers suddenly got very quiet, and turned nervously to plant director Viktor Bryukhanov as one. The big boss looked all of them in the eye with a stern expression.

And then his face broke into a grin.

“I hear you’ve been celebrating children, but let me tell you, comrades, the true joy begins with _grandchildren…”_ He was already pulling his wallet out to produce a small photograph. Khodemchuk, Perevozchenko and Yuvchenko went from nervous to excited with lightning speed as they crowded the proud grandpa, and Sasha seemed to take this opportunity to start for his wife.

Leonid straightened. Lyuba noticed his disquiet and cut off mid-sentence to look at him and see what had happened, but her worried frown quickly changed to a radiant smile when she noticed her husband approaching.

“Sasha, Lenya stole your wife,” Boris announced cheerily before any of them could say anything. 

Sasha rocked to a stop at that, and raised a questioning eyebrow at Lyuba. The tiny smirk playing in the corner of his lips made Leonid’s heart skip a beat or two.

Lyuba, for her part, just raised her chin haughtily.

“He did not steal me,” she stated, very firmly, tugging Leonid closer and almost making him spill his champagne. “I stole him. Mine now.”

“Is he, now?” Sasha asked nonchalantly.

“Yup.”

“Did he get a say in that too?”

“Nope.”

“Is that how you got married too?” Boris asked. 

Sasha just laughed heartily at that and shrugged. 

“Speaking of married, Lenya, isn’t your girl going to be mad at you for getting stolen? 

“What girl? He has no ring.” Razim observed. 

The group stared at Leonid’s hand at this.

“You’re right! But he had one, didn’t he?”

“Did you lose it?” Igor's question was so oddly sincere it made Leonid pause.

“Did _you_?”

“He did!” Alla chimed in. “It took him all of three months!”

“In my defence, it was a very small thing,” Igor muttered, ears red. “Very easy to lose.”

“I'm glad your head is not small enough to lose so easily, you dummy,” Alla teased.

“Is that why we never knew you were married?”

“...Yes?”

“You are a dumbass, Kirschenbaum.”

“Look who’s talking!”

“ _Boys!_ ” Nina interrupted. “Topic.”

“Oh yeah!” Boris perked up. “So what happened to that fianceé of yours Lenya?”

Leonid caught Lyuba, Inze and Sasha sharing a worried look; it made him even more nervous than the topic itself. He cleared his throat.

“It… we… “ he stopped, self-conscious. He felt his face go red. Lyuba squeezed his shoulder encouragingly. “Work got in the way, and we thought it was best if we both just went our separate ways. So here we are.”

He quickly downed the rest of his champagne, ignoring the awkward silence that followed, tried really hard not to cough, and pretended that the prickle of tears in his eyes was from the bubbles in the champagne. It’s been two weeks since he and Sveta broke it off, and it was still a sore spot, obviously. Inze squinted at him, sympathetic.

“Poor dear,” she said, with so much maternal worry in those two words it made Leonid’s throat tighten. “Did she need to move away?”

“No, it’s just… With me on the fifth shift, and her on duty basically all the time, we could barely meet.”

“On duty?”

“She’s a doctor at the hospital.”

“You never told us you were dating a _doctor.”_ Igor had the gall to sound indignant about that. 

Leonid scowled at him.

“You never told us you were _married.”_

“Fair point. Which doctor? Do we know her?”

“Do you know Dr Zinchenko?”

“ _No way.”_ Boris looked at him like he just saw him for the first time. “THE Dr Zinchenko? Lana Zinchenko?”

“That’s the one.”

“What about her?” Inze asked, innocent.

“She’s just the hottest doc in town. How the hell did you manage to get engaged to her??”

“She lives on the same floor as I do, we met a lot and kind of just got talking.”

“Sasha, did you know about this? Please tell me you did not.”

Sasha just smiled enigmatically. Lyuba sniggered.

“You traitor.”

“Hey, if you ever went walking like a normal person, Boris, you would have met them on their off days too, I reckon.”

“If he bragged about going out with the hottest woman in Pripyat like a normal person, I would’ve known about them!”

“Hottest woman in Pripyat, eh?” Nina did not look impressed. Boris gave her a sheepish smile.

“After you of course.”

“Too late, mate,” Leonid grinned at him, just a little bit vindictive, “you already messed this one up.“

Everybody broke out in laughter at that. It was Boris’ turn to be embarrassed. 

Sasha shuffled up to his wife, smiling mildly. His face was radiant and flushed, his hair just a bit out of order, his tie a little loose and askew. He was more relaxed and more gorgeous than Leonid has ever seen him. It was almost as intoxicating as the champagne.

Lyuba looked at her husband up and down, critical, and then asked the million ruble question like she was attuned to Lenya’s train of thought, but on a parallel track:

“Shura, what the hell are you drinking?”

Sasha lifted his glass to his eye level, like he only just now considered the matter too, and examined the dark purple, slightly murky liquid inside. He grinned at Lyuba under the bottom of the glass.

“Valera made beetroot vodka from his ma’s harvest. It’s _hideous_!” He was absolutely beaming, like it was the most wonderful thing he ever saw. He motioned with the glass towards Lyuba and Leonid. “Wanna try? Lenya?”

When the smell of the thing hit Leonid, he flinched back, and just about managed not to gag. Lyuba must have had a stomach made of steel though: she merely raised an eyebrow, grabbed the champagne bottle from the table next to them, poured Leonid some without looking, and took a swig of it, all while maintaining direct eye contact with Sasha, who looked delighted at this. 

“Fair. Anybody? Igor?”

“I’ll try,” Razim volunteered, earning a disbelieving look from Inze. “Can’t be that bad.”

“No... it’s worse.” supplied Sasha happily, and handed him the glass. “Careful, it’s strong.”

“I bet! I can smell it from here,” Igor said, pinching his nose. “Is that what Sitnikov is on?”

They all turned to observe. Anatoly Sitnikov, ever so calm and collected, was singing some terrible song about losing his heart on a game of cards, but really, _really_ badly. Attached to his sides were a laughing Lieutenant Pravik, clearly having the time of his life, and a reluctant, grumpy Dyatlov, trapped by his drunken colleague’s arm around his shoulders. He, as opposed to Pravik, did not look too pleased. Leonid snorted into his champagne.

“He might like it a bit.” Sasha’s voice quivered with barely repressed laughter. “Dyatlov… not so much.”

That did it. The group’s scattered giggles bubbled over into laughter as they watched their stone-faced, angry boss getting dragged around like a broken puppet by his equal in a mad, drunken jig. Dyatlov, luckily, didn’t even notice he was being laughed at by his subordinates. He seemed like he was busy trying to drink himself into a stupor to escape from it all, judging by the whole bottle of vodka, three quarters empty, clutched in a vice-like grip, in the hand Sitnikov didn’t tug back on his waist every time he tried to remove it. 

“Am I going to end up like that if i try this?” Razim eyed Sasha’s glass with an increasing amount of alarm.

“I hope not, you’re an even worse singer than he is, darling.” Inze patted his head encouragingly. 

“I drank it, and I’m not singing yet,” stated Sasha, like that was in any way relevant or reassuring. “Drink up.”

Razim shrugged, took a deep breath, and took a sip.

The face he made was indescribable.

“Which Valera made this, again?” his voice was hoarse, and his eyes started to water.

“Khodemchuk.”

“Then I’m pretty sure this is the stuff they clean the piping with during downtime, not vodka.”

“Drank _that_ much, did you?”

“After this, I swear I will try it, just to make sure he really nabbed plant inventory to peddle as beetroot vodka. Bastard didn’t even water it down. If I die from poisoning, he’s getting written up.”

Sasha took the glass back and took a swig. His expression didn’t change at all. Leonid didn’t know if it was scary or attractive at this point. Probably both.

The fact that _attractive_ was a legitimate opinion in his mind didn’t even register as anything strange. It was that sort of night.

“Are the boys alright?” Lyuba asked, almost as an aside.

Sasha waved, distracted.

“As long as you don’t hear Lev beating anyone up with his cane, it’s fine. The firefighter boys are having a blast with the kids. We’ve only lost one of them in battle so far it seems, so, doing good.”

Leonid ignored the faint heartsick feeling he got nowadays when he heard Sasha talk about his family with such obvious love, and peered in the direction he indicated. About a dozen or so children were swarming around three young men in dress uniforms; shrieking, laughing, and playing. One of the men was laying on the ground, taken down by a small mob of kids who were crawling all over him. He was gesturing weakly in a dramatic plea for help at a beautiful, glowing young blonde woman, presumably his wife. The lady pointedly ignored him, focusing instead on a small, wiggling bundle in her arms, the center of attention of a gaggle of cooing women. 

Leonid’s gaze searched the crowd of children mounting the attack on the firemen. Picking out Sasha’s young sons was a comparatively easy task. They both had his wide, friendly face and dark, nearly black hair. Yuri had something of his mother in the tilt of his eyes, but Lev looked like what Lenya imagined Sasha might have in his age, sans the glasses. 

Seeing them filled him with an indescribable feeling of joy mixed with a heavy sadness. So he decided to focus on Sasha instead: his fond little smile; his eyes, the deepest blue, crinkled at the corner; the flush high on his cheeks. His heart did a little somersault in his chest. 

Lyuba, as if sensing his mood, sighed dreamily and leaned heavier on his shoulder. That almost snapped Leonid out of his daze, but then Sasha turned and smiled at them both and he was lost again. He wanted to blame this feeling on the champagne entirely, but seeing as he wasn’t drunk day and night for the previous couple of months, he knew he didn’t have a ground to stand on. The things Sasha’s gentle, reassuring manner and his casual physical closeness made him think… During work hours no less… 

He hoped, desperately, that his feelings weren’t written on his face, or else he would be in deep, deep trouble.

Lyuba Akimov was probably a psychic, he concluded, or just had really amazing timing, because she looked at him quizzically at the exact time he asked himself the big question: _do I have a crush on my boss?_

She then glanced back at her husband, and Leonid could see the shape of a silent conversation in their eyes, Lyuba gently convincing and Sasha hesitant. They seemed to come to an agreement, as Sasha shrugged, and stepped towards them.

“I better get back before somebody drinks all of Valera’s pipe cleaner,” he said nonchalantly, and leaned in to kiss Lyuba goodbye on the cheek.

Only he was drunk enough to grab Lenya’s waist instead of his wife’s.

Leonid’s mind went blank when he felt his warm hand on his bony hip, under the suit jacket. Sasha tugged him close to his body. He was enveloped in the scent of musky aftershave and alcohol. Sasha slowly slid his hand higher up his waist; Lyuba and Lenya were so close together at this point that him leaning in to press his lips against her cheek had Lenya feeling the scrape of slight stubble on his jaw. He whispered something in Lyuba’s ear, but the words were lost in the roar of Leonid’s blood. He felt like he was going to go up in flames any moment, his face felt so hot. Lyuba giggled; Sasha’s hand travelled lower again, he gave a low chuckle that made Lenya’s insides turn to mush.

When Sasha departed with a cheeky wink and a mocking salute, he could have cried from the loss, were it not for Lyuba’s presence at his side. She sagged onto him with a contented sigh. She was fiddling with a slightly crumpled pack of cigarettes. Belomorkanals, Sasha’s brand. She probably fished it out of his back pocket while he was kissing her. At that thought Lenya felt himself blush again.

Lyuba managed to get a cigarette out of the pack with one hand somehow. Inze lit it for her with a lighter snatched from the inside pocket of Razim’s suit jacket. The two women shared a knowing look. 

Leonid felt oddly conflicted. He leaned his head on Lyuba’s shoulder, and she leaned her cheek on his head, blowing some smoke through his hair. They stood in companionable silence for a while. The others conversed around them, their voices blurring into an indistinct murmur.

When Lyuba spoke, low and quiet, Leonid was so far gone inside his own head, in this comfortable bubble, that he nearly missed what she said, were it not for the suggestive tone of her voice.

“He’s really caring, you know. Very _attentive_ , if you get what I mean.”

“Hm...?”

“Sasha. He will always know what you want, and give it to you. He’s a great partner.”

Leonid’s blush returned instantly. He wondered if Lyuba really meant what he thought she meant, if she felt how his heart hammered like mad, if she felt the heat radiating from his cheek as his mind wandered, unbidden, following that implication, to thoughts he definitely should not be thinking. Thoughts about his boss, whose wife currently had an arm around his shoulders, and was smoking with an air of nonchalance Lenya didn’t know was possible after a sentence like that.

He looked up at her in complete shock. She gazed back, steady as ever, and blew a plume of smoke directly into his face.

“He really likes you.”

Leonid giggled anxiously.

“I sure hope he does, it would be awkward working with him otherwise.”

Lyuba rolled her eyes and stuck her tongue out at him.

“That’s not what I meant and you know it. _He really likes you._ If he gets it together and asks if you want to go out for a smoke, say yes, you won’t regret it.”

Leonid thought that if his face got any hotter, he would burn the building down with the sheer force of his embarrassment. _Surely that can’t mean what I think it means…_ he thought.

He glanced across the room and managed to catch Sasha’s gaze. He looked stunningly handsome and flushed with Khodemchuk’s horrible beetroot pipe cleaner, but his eyes were clear as he started Lenya down, almost challenging him. Lenya looked away, somehow blushing even harder. He felt like his stomach was doing backflips.

With great difficulty he managed to stammer out:

“But I don’t smoke.”

“...are you normally this dense, or did you have too much to drink?”

To his great luck, he was spared from having to answer by the screech of the microphone. They all turned to the small podium, where Bryukhanov, seemingly done bragging about his grandkid for now, stood beaming with a mic in one hand and a champagne glass in the other.

“Ladies and gentlemen!” he began, with a smile in his voice. “Welcome to the Vladimir I. Lenin Nuclear Power Plant’s New Year’s celebration! I promise I won’t keep you long! I would like to say a few words as this year draws to a close. There are not enough words I can say that could adequately describe all the achievements we made this year. Through the unrelenting hard work of our employees, the Chernobyl plant has been the backbone of Soviet energy production. We met quotas and sailed past them, we set an example to the industry.”

“ A negative example?” muttered Boris. Razim snorted, and Inze shushed him.

“Earlier this month, our admirable building and quality control crew finished the last welds on Unit 5. I saw many of you on the day we finally went critical, all of us looking forward to a future even brighter.”

“ Of course, mentioning a brighter future, I cannot neglect to mention the wonderful families standing behind us all, through thick and thin and through all those long grueling shifts; and the Sixth Paramilitary Fire Brigade, keeping us safe always. We couldn’t do such exemplary work without you. For our next year, let us keep on leading by example, and exceeding every expectation, like we usually do. May the future be pleasant, the past a bright dream, and may our friends remain faithful and dear.” 

“Two hours, and we shall welcome a new year with the same old enthusiasm and industry! Thank you all for being here with us. Here is to a wonderful, productive 1987 comrades!”

  
  


_When I kill the lights_

_I can't control my mind_

_Free-floating shapes racing_

_All these things are overdue_

_But there's nothing I'd rather do_

_Swinging between hell and you_

_Trying not to confuse the two_

_It's life in a bubble I blew_

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Oh look, this is only a month and a half late for the New Year's Challenge!  
> I originally planned this to be just a fun office party shenanigans type of story, but then an idea lodged into my horrible little gremlin brain and I had to make it Toptumov, but poly, because being poly is fun, and also because I like being canon compliant to a degree, except canon in this case is real life. I'm already planning the sequel lol.  
> I am going to hell, and when I get there, they'll send Lyubov Akimova down from heaven to roast me over the hellfire personally for this, probably. I have no regrets.


End file.
